KIRTON AND FALKENHAM GARDENERS CLUB October meeting – Thurs. 13 October David Mitchell ‘Trees and the Law ‘ 7.30pm. Village Hall. September meeting - Barry Gayton – ‘Succulents’ For our first meeting of the Autumn/Winter season we welcomed Barry Gayton from the Desert World Gardens, Brandon for an illustrated talk on the strange world of succulents and cacti. Barry has spent 61 years growing succulents and still travels the country giving some 150 talks a year in addition to broadcasting and running his nursery where he has over 1500 succulent species and a stock of over 50,000! Barry clearly has a passion for succulents, you need to have because some can take years to come to fruition. If you would like to see them in the flesh Desert World Gardens, Brandon is open under NGS and welcomes visits by arrangement , April to September. October meeting – Thurs. 13th. October , ‘Trees and the Law’ David Mitchell’ David Mitchell of the Woodgate Partnership will be giving an illustrated talk on – ‘Trees and the Law ‘ a subject most people know very little about until they find themselves in trouble for hacking down a protected species! We look forward to welcoming David to the village hall. Also guests tickets for our Christmas meeting will be available - £5, no charge for members. November meeting – Thurs. 10th. Nov. ‘The Fragrant Garden Throughout the Year’, - Matthew Tanton Brown. We welcome back Matt who will be bringing plants for sale. December meeting – Thurs. 8th. December ‘ The Perennial Mr. Potter ‘– Brian Thurlow Note – we will be in the Church Hall for our Christmas special. There will be the usual grand draw and refreshments and no charge to club members. A limited number of guest tickets are available at £5 and will be on sale at our October and November meetings. Tales from the Allotments So far this has been a year of extremes. It started with a very mild winter with daffodils flowering from December but mother nature fooled our precious bees into thinking Spring had arrived and they awoke from their winter slumbers only to find no food and sadly succumbed. Then we had the heavy rains of March/April and , of course, more recently the relentless heat and drought of August. The result, for me, was the loss of mange tout peas, potatoes and tomatoes to blight, and runner beans and sweet corn suffering in the drought, although French beans seem not to be affected. Anyhow on the plus side were record crops of strawberries, onions, shallots ,garlic, butternut squash and courgettes. The jury is still out on leeks, celeriac and roots. ‘ Gardeners’ World to get a drizzle of Bake Off Magic’ screamed a headline in the Telegraph. The BBC have drafted in the Bake Off producer to oversee a revamp of the long running gardeners’ programme to attract a wider audience. Apparently it is too professional and needs to involve amateurs and a younger element. I caught the first hour long episode and was pleasantly surprised . I was expecting it to be dumb down , but apart from Flo Headlam , who appeared to be filling pots with plants but no compost, it was encouraging. I predict a future star in Adam Frost who trained under the great Geoff and who has a new house and vast gardens to play with. So we look forward to some new faces in the coming weeks lets hope one of them is not the dreaded Fern Britton! News from Stephen and Sally - Along with the usual range of vegetable and salad plants available for sale Roselea Nursery has recently announced a new development for 2017 season - Plug Plants to Order . Full details can be found on their website under the Latest News tab. They plan to produce plug plants for your personal order, this can be via the website – www.roseleanursery.co.uk - or call at the farm shop, they will produce your plants when you want them and in the correct season. More info via the website or call in to the shop and join the queue of plot holders! Roy Mallett 616